


Rayne

by ladygray99



Category: Firefly
Genre: Character Death, Cross-Posted on Tumblr, Dark, F/M, Kid Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-25
Updated: 2012-01-25
Packaged: 2017-10-30 02:53:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 868
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/326961
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ladygray99/pseuds/ladygray99
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They called the child Rayne</p>
            </blockquote>





	Rayne

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this about five years ago. Just found it again. Though it might be good to see where I’ve been, writing wise.

They called the child Rayne. It wasn’t much of a name but it was all they could think of. River and Jayne had talked about baby names for nine solid months. They had talked, joked, argued, thrown things. Rayne was what she was; too little and nothing grows, too much and all is washed away. Rain can create and destroy. It had taken several days and it was the Captain that decided on the name. Rain fell as they lowered two bodies into the ground.

Months after the little girl’s birth Simon managed to pull himself together enough to go through some of River’s things. He found a list of baby names, all girls, written in her fine hand. There were forty on the list, maybe twenty with circles around them. She had told Simon that she’d know when the child was born but she’d never made it that far. Technically she was dead when Simon pulled his niece wailing from her mother. Simon found a list of boy names badly spelled in Jayne’s hand. He was able to smile slightly at the sight of his own name heavily crossed out.

Rayne never asked about her mother. She’d listen to Simon’s stories about her mother as a child, and the Captain’s stories about her mother on jobs, but she never asked questions, never asked what happened. Simon often wondered just how much she knew. Just how much River had managed to place into her child’s brain before the end?

The new crew asked questions about Rayne. Why does a smuggling ship have a child on board, and just why does that child have morbid and creepifying knowledge that she shouldn’t? And why is a child of barely ten allowed to go over plans for jobs like a full member of the crew?

Rayne was as smart as her mother. She would blatantly point out problems with any plan. She was also far saner than her mother. Serenity actually managed to start turning a profit not long after she started talking.

When she was twelve she took out her daddy’s guns and insisted on going on a job. The Captain figured Simon would argue with him about letting the little one go but Simon just shrugged.

“She’s her own girl.”

It was moments like that Mal wanted to ground Serenity. Put her down next to five gravestones and let her rust there. Serenity kept flying though, even if there were days her own Captain wanted her to drop form the sky. Kaylee kept the engine turning because she could do no else. Simon kept the people running because it was what he did. Most of the time.

They got a new pilot. A kid called Dave. Not as steady as Wash, not as flash as River, but he got them from point A to B. Serenity went through a half dozen mercenaries, before they got a skinny, twitchy, guy called Wei. He was far better mannered than Jayne ever was, but never as well liked. Even after years they were replacements. Dave swore that every June, in they days leading up to Rayne’s birthday, it was like living in a flying cemetery, and he swore up and down some days there was a ghost in the cockpit. Zoe grinned and said there were probably two.

The child Rayne looked like her mother when she danced around the ship. Sometimes the Captain nearly cried catching a glimpse of long hair from the corner of his eye. For a moment he would think that his little albatross was back and not six feet under the soil of some moon. Zoe would get the same feeling, though she’d never say it, when she caught whiffs of the high end gun oil that Jayne had always used on Vera, and later Rayne used on all her guns.

They had kept all of Jayne’s guns though they could be sold for a pretty penny, and they kept all of River’s swords and books though they took up valuable space. Mal always figured Rayne would end up a fighter and maybe one day would want to take her mama’s swords and her daddy’s guns and find the men that took them both down. He wondered if those men would recognize Rayne. See River in the flow of her hair; see Jayne in the cold steel of her eyes.

It could be argued that Simon and Kaylee raised little Rayne but the truth was it was all of them, and none of them. Rayne ghosted around Serenity clinging on to one adult for a time, then another. She never seemed to need to be taught anything, just reminded briefly and she was quickly a master. Simon explained to Dave that she was a genius, but Dave had never met River and didn’t really understand what genius was. Zoe explained to Wei that her father had been the finest kind of mercenary, but he had never met Jayne and didn’t understand. Mal sat Rayne on his lap as a little girl and told her how much her parents loved each other, once they no longer hated each other. Rayne smiled and Mal wondered if she truly understood.


End file.
